Steve's Windsurfing Journal |
Went up in the morning around 10:30 am thinking I would go sailing for a couple hours. Plan was to rent from the Nantucket Community Sailing shack on the beach. This used to be run by Force 5 Watersports but changed hands just this year. Problem today was that the wind was blowing maybe 15 kn directly offshore, and I had promised myself never to sail in an offshore wind. Contributing to this resolve was the fact that only a couple folks were sailing, and all of them in wetsuits, except for a family bumbling in the shallows doing what I thought was a poor job of teaching the kids how to windsurf. Turned out they were getting a lesson from one of the kids at Community Sailing. They were using a leash on the board. Anyway, I almost sailed anyway because I figured the worst that could happen was that I got blown ashore on the Cotue spit and they'd have to come bring me back in a Whaler. But either good sense prevailed or I chickened out, one or the other, and walked home. Got to wade a bit though. Jetties has a very nice sandy bottom, but then drops off a hundred feet out or so. The further north on Jetties you go, though, the shallower it is further out. The beach is named after the jetty that extends from the point to the mouth of the harbor; we were on the harbor side of the jetty. On the ocean side is a swimming beach with lifeguards.
After I got home, Laurie wanted to make sure I got some sailing in before Hurricane Bonnie made it up the coast and I went the whole week without sailing. Thank you, Lol. So after lunch, we took David back up to Jetties -- in his stroller, where he mostly slept. By the time we got there at two, the wind had, if anything, picked up a bit, but there were a lot of people on the beach, and about a dozen folks windsurfing, half of them renting from NCS. I had to wait an hour to get a sail to use. I misjudged my abilities and went out on a 4.3 (Mistral trainer by Gaastra) and a Mistral board. After fighting the wind for 15 minutes, way overpowered, I went back in a traded in for a Windglider. I had more luck with this, and got a few good cross-wind runs, but had trouble tacking the wide thing. It was like trying to turn a tire. I think the boom is very low, too. But it was good to be on the water.
NCS is a bit unimpressive. First of all, they only have a half dozen sails. Second, the staff doesn't look much over 15 or 16 years old, and this is who gives the lessons. I don't mean to be ageist, but I saw one of the lesson-giving girls out with the 4.3, and she was getting blown over pretty badly. Worse yet, they really weren't being responsible, renting out equipment in such a stiff breeze to confessed novices. "Hey, just try to stay in the shallows, OK, dude?"
Unfortunately, this was it for the whole week in Nantucket. The weather was pretty crummy until we finally bailed on Friday in the face of three more grey Bonnie days.
Just decided to check out the store, as this is supposed to be the best place to get outfitted on the island. I didn't really ask about windsurfing since I didn't think I'd have much chance to use the gear. The store has mostly clothes up front for the Main Street strollers. In the back is a small but high quality selection of windsurfing paraphenalia, and a few Mistral boards hung from the ceiling. I got a hat and a sticker but that's as far as it went.
Laurie, David & I abandoned Nantucket for a weekend in Cambridge as it was further north from the hurricane and I wasn't in the mood to fly into the storm and also because we really like Boston and Cambridge. I was thinking maybe to rent a dinghy and do a little sailing in the Charles. We scored a great room on the 26th floor of the Cambridge Center Marriott at Kendall Square with a view overlooking Boston, MIT and the Charles River Basin. And what do I see in the Basin, interspersed with all the Boston Community Sailing and MIT dinghies? Windsurfers! About a dozen of them, all with the same orange and clear North sails. Things have definitely changed in the Charles since I lived here in the early 1980s and the big joke was "The Charles doesn't have a bottom; it just gets thicker as you go down."
Unfortunately it was late in the day, too late for me to abandon my family again in search of sailing. The next day, Saturday, was gross and rainy, so I unfortunately, along with the rest of the city from the look of it, gave up the idea of sailing today.
I'm going to have to research this and maybe change my idea of which city I want to live in.\
[Note: Turns out that windsurfers on the Charles River Basin may be rented through Boston Community Sailing in a program run in cooperation with CanAm, a windsurfing shop in Cambridge.]
Showed up around 2pm to 13-15 kn Westerlies. Not too many other folks out for some reason, maybe a half dozen cars in the lot. Jack Bushko was in and out, apparently getting in some ocean sailing in between lessons. Brought my dad and brother Mike along. Mike resisted for a while, first saying that he had to work on some computer stuff, and then that he wanted to take out the sneak box, but he eventually gave in. The wind got stronger through the afternoon, pushing up to about 20 kn, which was really too much for me to handle and way too much for Mike. So I did a few struggling runs back and forth across the cove and called it a day with about an hour's worth of time on the water.
The good news is that my lesson with Jack back in July definitely helped; working the arms independently made the sail much easier to control in the stronger winds.
But I was so tired after fighting the winds that I didn't stop to think when packing up. More on this tomorrow.
On the way back, we noticed the board jumping up and down on the top of Crazy Eddie's Windsurf Van. Crazy Eddie noticed this just before we headed over the big span of the causeway bridge (wind central) and we pulled over near Causeway Rentals to retie. Duh. My fault.
Historical note:
When I was a kid, probably the summer of 1973, we used to come and play where Sunset Park is now. It was municipal land then, too, but unimproved. Or rather, disimproved. Mostly orange dirt and some town trucks and the old water tower. But there were plenty of reeds growing around the water's edge and little tiny sand and seaweed beaches. My brother Doug and I used to be pirates there, burying treasure and fending off attacks from the bay. There were some dirt piles to climb on, too. We used to call it Secret Island because no one ever played there but us. It's fun to come back, 25 years later, still to play.
Pictures:
Me
Upwind
Me
Downwind
Mike's
Typical Position Today
Around 6 pm, I stopped by Bayview Park, 68th Street (Meade Street), Brant Beach, with Laurie just to check out the scene because I had really never been there before. Even at 6pm the lot was three-quarters full. The sign said $15/season or $5/daily for windsurfers. No one was sailing, but about a dozen people were packing up. They looked at lot more hardcore than the typical Sunset Park denizen. There were a couple trailers full of boards, guys with Naish sails, etc. But it was a pretty windy day. The launch and rigging area is pretty small, but workable. Looks like the bay there is pretty shallow going out, which is nice, and there's no boat channel for several hundred yards. Looks worth trying. Also, the launch area is right on the open bay rather than in a cove like Harvey Cedars, so an off-shore ocean breeze there will allow cross-sailing and the shallow water may make it easier to get back in.
Predictions of severe thunder showers and high winds for the afternoon, so Dad, Mike and I went out around 10:30 am. Good choice. Winds were around 8 kn and steady when we arrived, and out of the west. Around 12, they stiffened to maybe 11 kn out of the southwest, and kept increasing to maybe 15kn by the time we left at 1:45.
My lack of rigor yesterday when packing up revealed itself when I noticed that I couldn't find the daggerboard to the Kailua. Funny, I can remember exactly where I threw it on the beach and, uh oh, there I left it. Dang. Dad went off looking for official people to whom it might have been turned in, but hey, it was Labor Day and no one was either around or knew anything. I was hoping Jack Bushko picked it up when he cleaned up his gear for the day.
I tried a run across the cove sans dagger. Even in the relatively light breeze I got blown downwind (up the cove, almost into the docks) on a short run. This would not do. Went on a scrounging run around the park and came up with two liter and a half water bottles (one Evian, one Poland Spring). I flattened them on the concrete by the tennis courts, kept the caps on, and put them through the daggerboard hole in the board. Much better!! The board wasn't as maneuverable on turns, but most of the downwind motion stopped. We were off and sailing.
The only other folks there in the morning was this long-haired dude with a truck that said "Sponsored by Island Sports" full of gear. He was teaching a lady how to windsurf on a Tiga slalom board. Looked to me like she was having trouble mostly because the board wasn't floaty enough or wide enough. He was free styling, though, and pretty good.
The breeze was just right for practicing tacks and gybes. Jack's lesson was really paying off. Weight on back foot to keep from rounding up; my nose-mast-board nose aligned on a reach; forward shoulder pointing the direction I wanted to go. Excellent. Still having a little trouble smoothly tacking powered up, but for some reason was able to pull off the smooth gybes ever. Have to remember not to get flustered in traffic. Only fell once all day.
When the wind shifted out of the south west, I was able to run out past the southern point of the cove with no worries about getting back in. The big joke on me is that not too far beyond the channel, the water is only thigh deep. No flag on the south point house, though, the owners have gone home for the season. On the other hand, I didn't have to worry about being too close to their docks!
Jack Bushko showed up around 12:30 -- with my daggerboard! Jack, you are the man. Thank you very much. Windsurfers as a rule are nice folks, and it's people like Jack that keeps it all going around. He reported that the ocean conditions yesterday were awesome, but I'm a long way from that. Another half dozen folks showed up around then, too, looking for the big winds.
With the daggerboard, I could really turn on a dime. That was fun. Circled around Mike a few times in the water. Only ran over him once.
Mike got up sailing and was able to get out and back a few times. Was looking good by the time we left.
I was getting tired and took my last run, I guess. It was the best of the season, all the way out to the bay and back. Putting up quite a wake on the downwind reach. I was standing pretty far back on the board. In the gusts I lost control, though. Jack onshore made a motion to me that I think meant "Use your arms independently" but may it just meant I looked like a duck.
Around 1:30 Mom came out across the park and said there were severe thunderstorms in Philly that should be here in an hour and that we should come in. Laurie's folks in Syracuse had trees knocked down in there yard by a tornado that was part of the same front. So we went home, which I was ready -- almost -- to do anyway, as the wind was really picking up.
But I ran my mental checklist this time. Nothing was left!
Pictures:
Water
Bottle Daggerboard (top view)
Water
Bottle Daggerboard (bottom view)
Steve
sailing
Steve
sailing, Lesson Lady in foreground
Steve
sailing, Instructor Dude stylin', Lesson Lady looking
Steve
sailing in front of Harvey Cedars Bible Conference
Another memory. Back in 1981 during spring break I drove down to the Harvey Cedars Bible Conference because the church group I was a part of during high school was having a long weekend retreat there, and I wanted to say hello to all my friends I hadn't seen since Christmas. It's the only time I was ever in that magnificent old building. The view from the cupola is terrific, and the inside is comfortable. The inside of the hotel was pretty big and empty; mostly meeting rooms on the ground floor. Or maybe I'm remembering some other Bible camp. That was probably the last time I saw those folks as a group, except at some weddings over the next couple years. So it was the last time I saw the group in a familiar feeling environment, even though that kind of drop in made me feel like an outsider. The faces I remember from that trip are Kim DeLoach's and Janice Bergen's. It's interesting how many lives can pass through one place. I haven't seen most of those people for fifteen years, and sailing in front of there doesn't bring back any feeling of connection to those times. It was only when I saw the photograph that I realized that I was sailing today past a site from my earlier days.
Mike
sailing in close to Sunset Park
Mike
uphauling
Mike
sailing upwind
Mike
sailing downwind
Mike
at the end of a good run
October 2-4: ABK Windsurfing Camp in Harvey Cedars. Yeah! Total Immersion. I might actually get better.
